Another new chapter guys- I'm so proud of myself for updating so fast, but I know exactly where this story is going and I already have a sequel in mind! So will Musa finally tell her Dad her news? Read on to find out...

After a short, few hours of peaceful sleep in Riven's arms, Musa woke up at eleven in the morning feeling nauseous. Today she had to tell her Dad that she was pregnant, and she had to lie to his face that it had happened before she knew he'd arranged for her to marry Prince Jared of The Symphonic Nebula. "Oh, fuck," she muttered under her breath, as her head began to fill with worry again. She was pregnant. The fact had almost killed her already and still it kept on coming back to stab her. How in the realms was she going to explain to her Dad that she was pregnant? And then tell him how it happened at Alfea when getting pregnant whilst still at Alfea was considered disgraceful? She had butterflies fluttering away in her stomach from nervousness- no wait. Those weren't butterflies, and this feeling certainly wasn't due to nerves. Urgently, she leapt out of bed and ran through into her en-suite bathroom, where she collapsed onto her knees in front of the toilet and threw up. Exhausted, she wiped sweat off her forehead with the back of her hand. Was this morning sickness? She felt awful.

"Musa?" she heard Riven's voice call through form her room. "Are you okay?"

"Fine now," she lied. "Must have been all that pizza I ate yesterday," she said, remembering that Riven had only ate one slice of their shared twelve inch pizza. She didn't want Riven to worry about her or freak out if she told him it was probably due to her pregnancy. She walked back through into her room and sat on the edge of her bed. Riven was now sprawled across the whole thing and she didn't want to ask him to move; she needed to tell her Dad and she couldn't be distracted.

"So, what happens next?" Riven asked. "In your 'plan', I mean."

"Well I've..." Musa corrected herself: "We've got to tell my Dad, so..."

"Are you sure it's such a good idea for me to be there when you tell him?" Riven didn't sound happy.

"What, you want me to tell him by myself?" Musa complained.

"Well, no. I just think that it would be better if I wasn't there. If he attacked me don't think I wouldn't fight back."

Musa didn't like the thought of going to tell her Dad alone, but Riven was right. As soon as Musa told her Dad that it was Riven who got her pregnant, there was no doubt that her Dad would lash out at Riven if he was right in front of him. It was best for Riven to keep a low profile until her Dad calmed down.

Musa sighed. "Okay, you're right, but I hope that you can understand how difficult this is for me. It's not something I do every day-"

"Musa, I will go with you if you really want. I just don't think that it's a very good idea," Riven laughed.

"No, it's fine," she said.

"So when do you plan on telling him?" Riven asked.

"Well, I was thinking I could go now, before everyone's awake, then people won't overhear when my Dad gets mad."

"Nah that won't work," Riven said. "People will wake up. Why don't you wait until after dinner tonight? We'll all be eating with him anyway- that way you won't have to go and find him specifically, and it'll be late enough for you to escape off to bed if things get awkward."

"That makes sense," Musa agreed. Riven was so intelligent. She guessed growing up on the streets must have taught him his way around difficult situations. She kissed his forehead and then got back into bed next to him.

The day was mediocre and dragged exceptionally. After a morning in bed with Riven, Musa decided that she wanted to look presentable when she told her father that she was pregnant. She pulled on some Adidas sweatpants and a red vest top and then curled her hair with a quick spell that Stella had taught her. She kept her heavy bangs on her face- this would be a good method of hiding her expressions from her father when she got round to telling him. She also applied a little bit of makeup, including some light mineral foundation to cover any flaws, a neat line of black eyeliner and some volumising mascara. This makeup would make Stella proud.

She did some deep breathing after her makeup as an attempt to calm herself down, but the butterflies wouldn't leave her alone. She couldn't believe her own actions. It was alright when she was occupied in conversation or something time consuming, but when she was doing nothing she couldn't help but worry. This was something incredibly serious, and Musa wasn't ready for it. When she thought about it, her friends had acted pretty coolly- considering it was something that actually was going to affect them all and completely change Musa's life. This lead her to think about how over the next few years her time would be taken up by her child: she would have to teach it to talk and walk, decent manners (although she was sure that Tune, her pixie, would be happy to help with that), how to be good, the dangers of the magical world and of course help them to control their powers; assuming it was a girl. Musa didn't know why, but she just felt that she was going to have a girl.

Sitting down on the stool in front of her dressing table, Musa stared at her reflection in the mirror. She looked paler than usual, and she could see the pure fear in her own eyes. Today, she was going to tell her Dad. It had to be done now, there wasn't anything left to do. Looking at her worried face, Musa became angry at herself. "Oh for God's sake, Musa!" she told herself, "You've faced far worse than this! The witches, Baltor, Lord Darkar... the loss of your Mom..." She slammed her fist down on her dressing table; her cosmetics shook somewhat violently and a lot of them fell over. "You're not going to let this ruin your life!"

When it was eventually time for dinner, Musa told her friends that she was going to go to the bathroom and that she'd catch up with them, but really she was just having doubts again. What if her Dad was so angry that he never wanted to see her again? She couldn't lose her only family. Slamming herself against the wall, she broke down in tears. A million escape plans rushed through her mind at once, but they were all useless. She had to tell her Dad, it was the only way. She took a deep breath and went to join her friends, father, Jared and Riven for dinner.

Mealtime passed slowly and awkwardly with nobody saying much. Ho-Boe sat at the head of the table, with Jared and Musa either side of him sitting opposite each other. Musa refused to look up from her plate and pretended to just be struggling to twirl her spaghetti around her fork in order to avoid meeting Jared's eyes. She needed an excuse to get her Dad to stay behind and talk to her after dinner, but what could she say? She took a risky glance up and saw Jared attempting to seductively slurp his spaghetti. His eyes met hers and he smiled. Musa shuddered and looked over to Riven, who was sat at the other end of the table glaring at Jared, ready to strike. There was only thing that Musa could say to make her Dad listen to her.

"Dad?" she said. Everyone stared, especially Ho-Boe, who was particularly confused. They had barely spoken since her princess ball.

"Er... yes?" he replied nervously. The pair of them had never been good at talking to each other even before the marriage incident.

"I need to talk to you about..." Musa sighed. "I need to talk to you after dinner. About the wedding plans." She hated lying to her father, but it was the only way that he would agree to stay.

"Excellent!" he said. "I'm glad you're finally starting to cheer up!"

The rest of the meal was spent in silence and when they were finished everyone tried to leave quickly, except for Jared who was lingering.

"Now, now Jared!" Ho-Boe laughed. "You can't be part of this conversation, your bride may want to talk about something private, like her dress, and you don't get to see that until the day!"

Jared scowled, and reluctantly followed the Winx Club and the specialists minus Musa out of the room. He shut the door aggressively behind him, disgusted that he had been excluded from the discussion like the rest of them.

"What is Musa doing?!" exclaimed Stella. "Has she gone crazy?! She's not marrying him!" She pointed directly at Jared, who narrowed his eyes at her.

"You better watch your whore mouth," he snarled.

"She is not a whore," Brandon asserted, stepping in front of his girlfriend defensively. He felt sorry for Musa for having to marry Jared, but he'd never hated him. Until now.

"Well she looks like one in that outfit," Jared said, eyeing up Stella's miniskirt. "What does she charge? Five bucks an hour?"

Furious, Stella pushed Brandon aside. "This skirt happens to be Prada!" she yelled. "And I happen to be the future Queen of Solaria!"

Nobody else dared say anything as Stella marched up to Jared in anger. He looked bemused. "That's funny, I'm going to be King of The Symphonic Nebula when I marry your whore friend."

This remark infuriated Riven. He'd been unsuccessfully trying to ignore Jared's comments for the past few weeks, but this was taking it too far. Musa was his. She belonged to him. Nobody spoke about her like that and got away with it, not while he was around. He shoved his friends out of the way and approached Jared.

"Don't you dare call her a whore," he said darkly and everyone's eyes turned to him. They were shocked- Riven was usually a pretty hostile character, but they'd never heard him sound quite so angry or threatening.

"She's mine, I'll call her whatever I want to," Jared replied naively. "And, I'm going to fuck her like the whore she is."

Next thing anyone knew, Jared was on the floor against the wall, clutching his face in agony. Riven had punched him, his huge fist catching both Jared's nose and jaw perfectly. Blood began to gush from Jared's nostrils and he looked up at Riven. "How dare-" he began, but Riven grabbed his throat and dragged him up the wall. He held him so that Jared's eyes were level with his, so that his feet were barely scraping the floor.

"Don't you ever talk about her like that in front of me," Riven said, squeezing Jared's neck tighter and tighter. Jared was gasping for air.

"Hey, Riven. Take it easy," Brandon said, placing a hand on his friend's shoulder. "This won't solve anything."

"He needs to learn his lesson," Riven snarled.

"This isn't the way," Brandon replied. As much as he wanted to throttle Jared himself he knew that this would only get Riven kicked out by Musa's father if Jared decided to say anything.

Riven snarled again and threw the wheezing Jared to the floor. He scrambled onto his feet and looked at them all, flabbergasted. "You'll be sorry for this, you tramps!" he said and began to run away. "I will fuck her, Riven!" they heard him call. "And she's going to scream my name! Just you wait!"

"That's funny," Stella said. "They say size doesn't matter but I heard you need at least three inches to satisfy a woman!" Everyone laughed, apart from Riven.

"You're the one who's going to be sorry," he muttered, and followed his friends as they went to hang out in their favourite room to wait for Musa.

Every room in Musa's house had soundproofed walls, so luckily her and her father hadn't heard the commotion just outside the door.

"So what is it you wanted to discuss, Musa?" Ho-Boe asked. "I'm glad that you've finally come to your senses and realised that I'm doing the right thing for you. And being Queen of the Symphonic Nebula will help you easily jumpstart your music career."

"I don't need to be a Queen to have a music career," Musa said. "Dad, you're a realm famous rock star for God's sake."

"True, true," Ho-Boe laughed. "But what are you here to talk about anyway? You want to know when you'll be picking out your dress?"

"I won't need a dress, Dad," she sighed and began to fiddle with the corner of a napkin.

"Well you're not getting married in jeans!" he laughed, somewhat nervously.

"I'm not getting married full stop," Musa told him.

"Oh, Musa. Don't start this nonsense again! You are marrying Jared-"

She interrupted him. "No, Dad. I can't marry him."

"Yes you can."

"Would you just listen to me?" her voice raised as she became frustrated. "I can't marry him."

"Why not?" Ho-Boe asked cynically.

Musa hesitated. "Because... Because it would be dishonourable... According to The Code of The Harmonic Nebula."

"And why's that?"

Musa thought back to the conversation that she had been rehearsing in her head all day. "Our law states that you can't proceed with an arranged marriage if... if... the bride to be was already engaged to another man... if..."

"Well you were not engaged prior to this, Musa. So what is the problem?"

Musa ignored him. "If... if... the person who arranged the marriage, died before the date of the wedding..."

"Well I don't plan on that any time soon, and Jared's mother is only in her forties. Please stop wasting my time, Musa." He started to stand up.

"Or if... if... if the bride to be... was... pregnant... before she knew about the arrangement." There. She had said it. It felt as if a rock had been lifted off her chest by nymphs.

"And your point is?" Ho-Boe asked, now fully stood up. Musa felt sick. Had he really missed it when she had made it that obvious?

"My point is I can't marry Jared." Was she really having to repeat herself?

"Musa, we've already been through this. You're marrying Jared and that's final." He started to walk away. How could he be so oblivious? Musa bit her lip. She had to say it- he was almost out of the door.

"Dad, I'm pregnant," she said matter-of-factly.

Ho-Boe stopped in his tracks. "You're what?" he hissed in disbelief.

"I'm pregnant," she repeated.

"You're what?!" Ho-Boe yelled this time, turning back around to face his daughter, both enrage and denial clear in his expression.

"I'm pregnant. And I have been since the last night at Alfea." Now that she had said it once, saying it again and again was easy. The deed was done. There was no going back.

"Have you no pride?" her father accused her. His entire body was shaking, his face turning red, sweat began to shine on his forehead. "At Alfea... you... you... you whore." He emphasised the last word.

Musa was shocked, outraged, and mostly upset. This word, it was just a word. It was meaningless. Yet coming from her father, her father who she loved, it hurt so much...

"I am not a whore," she defied pathetically. "And I am not marrying Jared!" She couldn't help it. Her own hysterical tears began to crash around her.

"I thought we were finished with your days of bad behaviour!" Ho-Boe continued to yell. "I thought all that nonsense was over long ago, but no! This is you really going off the rails!"

Musa laughed at this allegation. "Going off the rails? That's rich- coming from an ex cokehead and alcoholic!" she shouted back at her Dad, referencing his troubled past as a member of a rock band.

Ho-Boe's face had turned an unhealthy shade of purple. "How dare you!" he roared. "You bring shame on this entire family!"

"This family? This family?" Musa sneered through her cries. "This family- you and me, Dad. You and me. That's all it is! Mom's never coming back, is she, Dad?"

Ho-Boe was speechless.

"Is she?" Musa repeated more calmly.

"Don't you talk about-" Ho-Boe began, but Musa shouted over him.

"No, Dad! I am so sick of living like this! Sick and tired of this misery! No amount of substance is going to bring her back, Dad!" Musa knocked some glasses off the table and they shattered onto the floor. Broken, just like her. "I am not marrying Jared!" she wailed and ran out of the room.

"Now you wait here one minute, young lady!" her Dad called after her, but she had already disappeared into the vast maze of the mansion.

Ho-Boe could not believe how his daughter had just spoken to him, and what she had said to him. He slammed his fists down on the table with rage, shattering more glasses. "What the fuck!? How can she be pregnant?" he shouted to himself, and then felt his eyes fill with tears. Was this his fault? Was he responsible? He had never really been there for Musa, he'd spent the last fifteen years of his life pining for her mother, and Musa was right- nothing could bring her back. He walked over to the cabinet and picked out a bottle of whiskey and removed the lid. He smelt it, but didn't taste it. Instead, he poured it out onto the floor and watched as the brown liquid collided with the cream carpet, not even caring about the damage. Everything around here was already unfixable.

That night Musa once again found herself crammed into her bedroom with all of her friends surrounding her. She was absolutely distraught; her and her father had never argued like that before.

"Come on, Musa. It's not so bad," Bloom said, reaching an arm around her friend.

"Not... so... bad?" Musa sniffed. "My own father called me a whore!"

"If it makes you feel any better, Jared called you a whore too," Stella added.

"Great," Musa said sarcastically. "That makes me feel so much better."

"Well the fact that Riven almost killed Jared after he said it should make you feel a little better," Sky said.

Musa looked up at Sky, and then at Riven who was sulking in the corner. "What...?"

"It's true," Timmy confirmed.

"Yeah, Jared called you a whore and Riven bust his nose and nearly strangled him," said Brandon.

"Wow..." was all Musa could respond. She knew Riven shouldn't have done it- he could get into serious trouble if Jared told anyone, but it made her feel so happy and safe that he was so protective over her. She'd have to thank him properly for that later when everyone else left.

"Anyway," Tecna said, directing the conversation back to the most important matter. "It's better that you told your Dad sooner rather than later."

"Tecna's right," Bloom agreed. "Now he has more time to accept it before it becomes obvious." She nodded towards Musa's currently flat stomach.

"Yeah, but the worst part is he didn't even say anything about calling the wedding off," Musa sighed, and noticed that Riven suddenly seemed attentive.

"Oh, don't worry about that, Musa. He just needs to get over the initial shock," Bloom explained,

"Yeah, he has to call off the marriage- it's written in the laws of your realm that you can't proceed with it if you were pregnant beforehand, and you told him that you were."

"And you have the proof," Riven finally made a contribution. "You have those papers, from your friend, that said you got pregnant at Alfea."

"See! It's all going to be fine!" Bloom said, smiling.

"Yes, and it's a proven fact that fathers are more overprotective than mothers," said Tecna.

"That's definitely true," said Stella, looking uneasy as if she were thinking of an unpleasant memory.

"He just needs time," Flora smiled. "It'll be difficult for him to handle that his daughter's innocence has been taken, but he'll come around- he loves you."

"You should have told him it was me that got you pregnant," Riven said. Musa was amazed, but happy, that he was speaking so openly in front of their friends. "Now you'll have to talk to him again and tell him that it was me."

"Just wait for him to ask, Musa," Stella suggested. "It'll be so much easier for him to hear when he's ready to hear it."

"I hate to admit it, but Stella's right," said Tecna. "It wouldn't make sense to go and cause more arguments. Wait for him to come to you."

It was decided that Musa would wait for her Dad to talk to her himself, if anything to prevent him from killing Riven, and thankfully the Winx Club and the specialists were able to have a few more cheerful conversations, such as Stella and Brandon's wedding and various methods of killing Jared, before heading off to bed. When everyone had gone, Musa and Riven were left alone in Musa's room.

"I really appreciate what you did," Musa confessed as Riven came to sit down on her bed beside her.

"Hmm?" he replied, puzzled.

"Sticking up for me to Jared," she said. "It was very... nice of you."

"That's okay," Riven replied simply.

"I want to thank you for it," she smiled cheekily and he raised his eyebrows.

"Is it... safe... in your condition?" he asked and Musa laughed at him. He was smart yet so stupid sometimes- it was one of the things she loved about him.

"Yes!" she giggled and began kissing him. He kissed her back hungrily, forcing his tongue into her mouth. They only broke away so that Riven could pull off his shirt.

"It's nice to have a big, strong, hero to look after me," Musa said seductively, emphasising the word 'big'.

"I bet it is," Riven said, kissing her again, but Musa pulled away quickly.

"I hope you'll be more gentle with me than you were with Jared," she said, looking at him with puppy dog eyes and running her hands down his chest.

"We'll see about that," he said, and Musa allowed herself to fall underneath him.

So there you are! Hope you enjoyed this chapter. Will Musa's Dad change his mind, or will Musa still have to marry Jared? It's all coming in the next chapter! Thanks for reading, and please review

xxMazzy